


Come Some Summer Midnight

by rev02a



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Aliens, Aliens Made Them Do It, F/M, Imprisonment, M/M, Paranoia, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Temporary Character Death - Jack Harkness, references to doctor who
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-07-13
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:14:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25248250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rev02a/pseuds/rev02a
Summary: The Doctor faced a monster on the planet of Midnight. It’s really a shame that there’s a rift in space and time that tears right through Cardiff.Reposted from my Livejournal, originally written in 2010.
Relationships: Gwen Cooper/Rhys Williams, Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones
Kudos: 41





	Come Some Summer Midnight

The Rift alert took the team out to a residential alleyway in Adamsdown. The spike was comparable to something coming through, and the preliminary scans suggested that nothing technological was to be found, the “organic” scan came back inconclusive.

“Oh great,” Owen sniped from the passenger seat, “last time we saw that combination it was a virus… or a copy of _the Metro_ from 1995 with blood on its pages.”

Gwen strained against her seat belt to lean forward, “I don’t understand why such complex alien technology is so hard to use sometimes. I swear that more often than not we have to use less advanced methods in the end—old copper style.”

“Yes, well,” Owen continued, condescendingly, “we know how competent those methods can be since we have to clean up after Cardiff’s best all too often.”

Gwen took a deep breath in preparation to defend her old job. In the backseat, Toshiko, apparently a bit frustrated at the bickering, leaned closer to the side door and typed into the on-board keyboard with force.

Jack flashed a grin in the rear view mirror, “Well, hands-on is _way_ more fun!”

He was apparently aware of the tension as well. Part was the weather, of that he was sure. It had been a strange summer with lashing rainstorms and blustery wind that would have made A.A. Milne’s famous bear prepare to fly a kite—or a piglet. The maelstorms would only be broken up only by stifling heat that made people unbearable. In combination with some sort of strange lingering irritation about Jack’s so-called “holiday” with the Doctor, the team snarked at one another. Wounds that had finally begun to scab over were picked at again, and no one seemed safe. Gwen and Owen had been at each other’s throats recently about “secondment,” as if the Captain were not the one to assign that position. Tosh seemed to be retreating into herself more, and her focus was only divided from her programming when she simply had to escape the barbs of her colleagues. Ianto was avoiding the mess all together. Hiding away from the main Hub was his own way to avoid snapping (or shooting) his co-workers. When he wasn’t locking himself away in the Archives or Tourist Office, anyone was in danger of facing his sharp tongue. Jack suspected that most of Ianto’s sullen peevishness came from trampled hopes of the yet-to-be-taken-date. Combine these personality differences with Rift spike after Rift spike that left the team drained and aching for their beds, and Torchwood was basically a tinderbox. Jack suspected that the ignition was coming.

“The Rift signature is active in 500 yards, to the right,” Tosh directed, already reaching for the door handle and her PDA. Jack braked and threw the SUV into park. The vehicle swayed with the abrupt halt.

“Comms check; Hub to team,” Ianto intoned, bored, into their ears via Bluetooth.

“Sato check.”

“Harper check.”

“Cooper check.”

“The dashing, daring, and handsome—“

“Right, comms are go,” Ianto transmitted from the Hub. Jack grimaced. If he was interrupted that quickly, then Ianto wasn’t in a good mood either.

Tosh swept her PDA around the alley entrance for a better reading. Jack, Owen, and Gwen circled around her, guns drawn, looking for a could-be-organic-possibly-virus-possible-newspaper alien thing.

“I have…residual traces… That doesn’t make sense!” Tosh cried, suddenly so frustrated Owen thought that she might stamp her foot. “I am getting dissipation like the Rift spike happened hours ago.” She poked at her screen with growing irritation. She huffed in frustration before muttering to herself in broken sentences of half English-half Japanese.

Gwen lowered her gun marginally. Jack stepped out of their circle and began advancing down the alley with a lit torch and primed gun. Owen followed, his eyes and torchlight focused on the roof edges above them.

“Ianto,” Tosh called, tapping her earpiece, “I’m patching these numbers through to you.”

“Copy.” There was silence for a beat. “I’ve received the data; I’m running it through Mainframe now. Maybe she can—“

“Right,” Jack interrupted, “I understand that the readings don’t make sense. I’m more concerned right now about possible aliens who can manipulate time and make the readings look like that.”

Tosh stuffed her PDA into her pocket and drew her gun. “Gwen, Tosh, go around to the street front. We’ll circle around and meet you at the end of the block.”

The women moved along stealthily, Gwen leading and Tosh watching behind them. The night was humid. The streets were wet and puddled, and lightening, even in the absence of rain, streaked across the sky. It was the sort of night that was made for pub gardens and late night drinks with friends. Had it not been a weeknight, people would be out taking advantage of this weather, Gwen thought.

There was no evidence of an alien on the street. Nor was there any evidence in the alleyway. There were no bums or streetwalkers to interview.

“Well this was a fucking waste of time,” Owen offered, with his usual sweetness. He smiled at his teammates. It was all teeth and no joy.

The four made their way back to the SUV. A gentle breeze kicked up some abandoned newsprint in the street and tossed it around their feet. Gwen reached up and pushed her windblown hair behind her ear. A bolt of lightening zigzagged across the sky and Tosh looked up to track it. Owen was obvious to all around him. He was focused on his destination. If he timed it right, he could get a kip in on the ride. Jack reached up and toggled his earpiece.

“We’re headed back. Nothing here.” Jack pushed the unlock button on the SUV’s key ring. Each team member, now moving with the sudden exhaustion born of an expelled adrenalin rush, opened their door and climbed in. Jack closed his door and touched his earpiece again. “Ianto, I said we’re headed back.”

There was still no response. Jack’s brow knit and he slid the key into the ignition.

“Can you raise Ianto?” Jack asked the others, the order not explicitly mentioned to one team member. Owen snapped his seat belt into its buckle and then pointedly leaned against the window and closed his eyes.

“Sato to Hub.”

“Sato to Hub.”

Gwen looked mildly panicked. She tried. Jack turned the engine over.

“That’s not good,” he commented, and tried to hail Ianto again.

In the alley behind them something knocked into a rubbish bin. Owen opened his eyes and looked past his reflection into the darkness. Jack put the SUV into gear. Owen reached over and gripped Jack’s arm.

“Hold on,” he ordered and grabbed his torch. He flicked the light on and looked out the window. He cussed at the light’s reflection, and lowered the glass. The light shone into a dark alleyway.

“What is it?” Jack asked over Tosh’s continued failed attempts at contacting Ianto.

“Thought I heard something,” Owen commented, pushing the button again. The glass slid upward with an automated whine.

Behind them, Gwen grabbed her gun out of her trousers. “Something just moved out my side!”

Jack put the SUV back into park and looked out his own window. “I don’t see anything, Gwen.”

“It was a shadow,” she said, her voice settling into the PC Cooper range, “I saw a shadow.”

At that moment something jumped onto the roof of the SUV. The vehicle rocked violently from side to side, before settling. Gwen yelled and Tosh sunk in her seat in order to look up. Owen cursed and unbuckled his belt, struggling to upholster his gun. Jack gained the sharp, hard look that he used to assess situations.

“Stay buckled!” he shouted, and threw the SUV into reverse. He accelerated hard, as Owen struggled to redo the belt. Without warning, Jack slammed on the brakes. The passengers were thrown forward, their seat belts locking.

On the roof, nothing fell off. Tosh grimaced. Whatever was on the roof shouldn’t be there now. It was basic physics. Force, acceleration, and inertia: it was a science. Sometimes, that was why she hated this job. Science didn’t always apply.

Jack took a steadying breath. That should have worked. Owen glanced at Jack and took the safety off his Glock.

Then, whatever was on the roof began to knock.

Tosh met Jack’s eyes in the rear view mirror. “Sentient?” she asked, surprised and how breathless and meek she sounded.

_Knock, knock, knock._

“Human,” Gwen countered, reaching for the window button. She began to put the glass down when Jack threw the switch routing all power to the driver.

“Don’t,” he hissed at her. He unbuckled his seat belt.

_Knock, knock, knock._

“Hub to Harkness! Jones to Harkness! JACK, are you there?” Ianto sounded down the comms. The team all jumped at his hail.

“Ianto!” Jack responded. “About time.”

_Knock, knock, knock._

Static broke up Ianto’s transmission. “—Archives—report—similar Rift spik—July 19—creature—“

“Ianto! Repeat!” Gwen called, her eyes locked on the marginal gap that she had created by letting the window down. It was only a quarter of an inch.

Jack turned to Owen. “Get ready to drive.”

Owen looked confused at first, before reaching for the steering wheel and pulling himself across the console. Jack slid behind him and into the passenger seat.

_Knock, knock, knock._

Jack manually unlocked his door. He drew his gun.

Ianto’s broken transmission continued. “—control—the team—repeated—resulted in--“ There was a long buzz of static. “JACK! –do you read?!—JACK!—RETREAT!”

The last word, shouted through static, made Jack stutter as he threw open the door and dove out into the alley. Too late now. He slammed the door and pivoted around, gun aimed at the roof.

There was nothing there.

“JACK!—Retreat! Retreat!”

The streetlights on the road blinked out. The SUV engine suddenly cut out. Owen’s torch died. And then something—like a shadow—leapt across the darkness and slammed into Jack’s chest. Gwen screamed as Jack was thrown backward into a murky puddle and even more pervasive darkness of the alley.

“Sato to Jones! Sato to Jones!” Tosh cried, urgently.

In the driver’s seat, Owen cranked on the key again and again. The SUV didn’t stir. Gwen wrenched the door open and ran, gun before her, into the alley. She left the door open.

“Sato to Jones!”

“Fuck! Tosh get that door closed!” Owen commanded. Tosh lunged across the seat and yanked the door shut. Gwen disappeared into the shadows of the alley. Owen could make out the line of her back, but that was all.

“This is Jones! Go ahead!” Ianto was clearly worried.

“Something attacked Jack!” Tosh yelled. She quickly raised her PDA and tried to get an energy reading off the area where Jack, the shadow, and Gwen were—but the battery was dead.

“A shadow?” Ianto asked, wearily.

“How did you know?” Owen snapped, gun resting against the steering wheel. His eyes hadn’t left the alleyway.

“Sedate him, tie him up, and get back to the Hub now,” Ianto demanded, his voice taking on steel like quality.

“Who died and made you second?” Owen exclaimed.

“Sedate him, Owen. Tie him up and get back here fast.”

Owen cursed. Repeated orders rarely held good news. He and Tosh moved from the vehicle. They circled slowly, guns drawn, looking for a target. The moon cast eerie shadows into the darkness. Somewhere in the night, cars drove by. Gwen crouched in the alley, murmuring softly to Jack.

“C’mon, Jack, it’s just me. Let’s go back, ok?” she spoke softly, like she was talking to a frightened animal.

Owen took no chances. Following Ianto’s advice, he loaded a syringe with a high-powered sedative and then moved to Jack. Jack was huddled in on himself, leaned against the brickwork of the mouth of the alley. Owen moved quick and stabbed Jack into the arm. Gwen let out a cry of alarm. Jack slumped, bonelessly.

“Tie him up, Tosh,” Owen commanded. Gwen squawked in indignation again.

Tosh looked angry, but did as she was told. Together, she and Owen hoisted the Captain and laid him in the back of the SUV.

“I don’t understand,” Gwen cried, wringing her hands.

“Ask the Teaboy,” Owen snarled, as he climbed into the driver’s seat. He tried the engine. Nothing. He reached down the popped the bonnet. He grabbed for his torch and attempted to turn it on. Also, nothing. He cussed.

Gwen hailed Ianto. “What’s going on? Owen sedated Jack.”

There was a heavy sigh down the comms. Even Owen paused. “It’s a creature and it’s taken Jack’s mind.”

“Right, well, that’s comforting. Somebody come cover me while I try and charge the battery,” Owen snarled, and moved to the boot for the emergency kit.

Tosh, stood nearly back-to-back with the medic, scanning the alleyway slowly. Her gun never wavered. Gwen had moved to the driver’s seat and was coaxing the battery to charge turning the key again and again. Finally, they were on the road.

Ianto met them with a gurney in the car park. He looked grim. “We’ll take him down to a containment cell.”

“We can’t!” Gwen objected. “He’s in charge—“

“Sorry, love, he’s been compromised, looks like I’m in charge now,” Owen replied, bitingly.

“I’m the second!” Gwen yelled. Her voice echoed off the car park roof.

Ianto caught Tosh’s eye and began to roll Jack into the Hub. “I’m sorry, Jack,” he spoke to the man unconscious on the gurney, “but this isn’t going to be pretty.”

Tosh followed along behind him, rubbing her mouth with her hand.

Gwen and Owen bickered about who was in charge for another half an hour. Ianto ordered dinner, photocopied the file he had referenced from the Archive, and, with a glare, herded the team into the conference room. Tosh, with an operational laptop, began inputting her collected data from the spike to compare against the 1971 case.

“Right,” Ianto began, sliding a file across to each of them. Owen and Gwen fought for the right to sit in Jack’s chair. “In 1971 a similar case came through the Rift. Torchwood Agent Maggie Derit was mentally compromised by an unknown creature that was described to look like a—“

“—Shadow, yeah, yeah, we got that.” Owen snarled, leaning across the table. “But what the hell happens now? It’s got Jack.”

Ianto glared. “I was getting there.”

Tosh looked up from her laptop screen and glanced between the two men. Without Jack here to defuse their personalities, they tended to end up resorting to violence.

“Agent Derit was frightened to begin with—withdrawn and silent—“

“Jack was like that in the alley way!” Gwen interjected excitedly.

“—And then she began to repeat everything that was said.”

“She what?” Owen asked, disbelievingly. “Like a kid?”

“No,” Ianto replied, leafing through the file, “according to the dialog recorded here, the creature began repeating with a time lapse, but the longer it was around others, the less the delay became. After about thirty minutes, the creature was speaking in tandem with the other agents.”

Ianto flipped the page and looked at it accusingly. “The creature honed in on one particular person—Agent Gill Green. As the communication continued, the creature took on Green’s persona and began speaking what Green was thinking before he could.”

“What was the outcome?” Tosh asked, fingers hovering over the keyboard. She asked, but she was sure that she already knew.

“Derit and Green were contained and then eliminated.”

Gwen drew a dramatic breath. She covered her mouth with a hand. “We can’t kill Jack!”

“Actually,” Owen drawled darkly, “we can.” He dropped the crust of his sandwich onto his plate and shoved it away from him.

“On another note,” Ianto continued, “the reports note interesting side effects—the team began to suffer from severe cabin fever, specifically paranoia, the longer the creature was around them. Two team members even held guns to one another’s heads during the Derit and Green repetition period.”

“Then we go into lockdown,” Gwen decided. “All guns into the armory.”

“Oh, really,” Owen countered, “and what do we do when there is a Rift alert? Let’s be honest, this past hour has been the biggest rest we’ve had in days. It’s not apt to stop because we want it to.”

“Actually,” Tosh intercepted deftly, “the rift prediction software projects that we have a reprieve until about two tomorrow afternoon.”

“Well bless that,” Owen sighed, his shoulders relaxing. “I’m going to take some blood then.” He rolled back from the table and stretched.

“Wait, what?” Gwen asked, jumping to her feet.

Owen waved his hand at the file distributed by Ianto. “In 1971, they spent so much time trying to kill one another, the medic didn’t do his job. I, however, am about to do mine.”

Gwen frowned at the file. “When did you learn that?”

Owen looked at her, levelly. “When I read the file. I’m a genius, me. I don’t need to have everything dumbed down by the office boy for me to understand.”

And he strode from the room. Gwen chased after him. “Well if you’re going down to see Jack, then I’m coming.”

Tosh met Ianto’s eye before reaching for the second half of her sandwich. “This will end well.”

“I think Gwen may have a point,” Ianto reasoned, looking toward the doorway, “I think we should lock the armory.”

Tosh tapped her fingernail against her plate. “Are you worried about that?”

Ianto glanced at her. “I shot Owen once under duress. Jack was the center of that ‘discussion’ as well. I’d not like a repeat performance.”

Tosh giggled. Together, they collected five handguns from each team member’s desk and locked them away. Ianto set a command into the keypad that would only allow Jack’s pass code to open it. Granted, he also knew the code, but he also knew where the weapons were in the Archives, so it didn’t much matter.

In the cells, Gwen watched with wide eyes as Owen punched in his code. Jack, sans greatcoat, was sitting exactly where they’d left him. His knees were hunched to his chest, and his back was leaned against the stone wall. He watched Owen enter the cell with the glazed gaze of the drugged. Gwen thought that he looked like a stoned puppy with that expression.

“Hello, Harkness,” Owen said, softly, “I’m here to take some blood, ok, mate?”

Jack blinked sleepily and then, with the same inflection, repeated Owen. “Hello, Harkness. I’m here to take some blood, ok, mate?”

“Oh,” Gwen shuddered, “that’s creepy.”

Jack slowly faced her. “Oh, that’s creepy.”

Owen nodded in agreement, and then began to roll up Jack’s sleeve. In the corridor between cells, Gwen shifted her weight. It was unbearable to see Jack like this—compromised, was the word everyone kept using.

“Little prick,” Owen warned, more out of habit than anything.

“Little prick,” Jack repeated, quicker this time.

“The delay is shortening,” Gwen gaped.

“The delay is shortening,” Jack echoed.

Owen held up his hand in a motion to silence Gwen. She ground her teeth. He was not in charge. He was, however, filling a vial with blood. And then another. And another.

“Just how much do you need! You’re not a vampire!”

The concerning thing was, Jack spoke only a word or two in delay that time. It jolted Owen out of his doctor mode, and he jostled the needle. Jack squirmed in pain. Quickly, Owen capped the vial, removed the needle, and pressed a cotton ball over the prick point. He plastered over it without a word and gathered his supplies.

He exited the cell—not quite at a run, but nearly, and sealed the Plexiglas door in haste. He shuddered.

“Fucking weird.”

Jack nearly spoke with him. Gwen grabbed onto Owen’s bicep and squeezed. Her fingernails bit into his skin. Owen grimaced, and then pulled her toward the door to the main Hub. He did not look back at the Captain.

Tosh and Ianto watched the going ons via in-house CCTV. Ianto stepped back from Tosh’s workstation when the other two reached them. Owen offered no explanation when he moved to the Autopsy to run Jack’s blood. He just nodded to Tosh and brushed past Ianto to make it to his area of the Hub. Gwen crossed her arms across her chest and glared at them both.

“Well, found anything else in the Archives?”

Ianto hugged a handful of files to his chest—he did not have time to be emotional, personal relationship or not, he had a job to do. Clutching the files was just a physical tell that he wasn’t completely all right. It was best to put them down. “No other recorded case of this happening. There are other creatures who repeat to learn behaviors of a culture.” He shrugged. Tosh picked up the narrative.

“Babies do the same thing. Basically, this creature is a learning being. It’s smart too. According to the 1971 case, I expected that the repeating would work slower than the creature that has compromised Jack has been. Perhaps this is an older creature, or maybe a smarter creature.”

Owen, face blank and white, rejoined them from his work area.

“How’s the blood work going?” Gwen demanded, arms still crossed.

Owen looked at her and then glanced at the screen open behind Tosh.

“Owen, what is it?” Gwen demanded.

Tosh’s eyes widened and she too whipped around to face the screen. She’d heard it too.

“What is it!” Gwen squealed in irritation, her face reddening with anger. Ianto heard it also. He slapped his hand across Gwen’s mouth and stared in horror at the screen.

Gwen fought. “Get off m—“

And she heard it too. Jack, via CCTV, was speaking with them. He was speaking at the same rate. His eyes darted up and locked on the camera. Owen stiffened. Ianto lowered his hand from Gwen’s mouth.

“He can—“

“—hear us.” Jack finished the sentence before Gwen did.

Gwen screamed.

Tosh turned off the CCTV feed. The four stood frozen.

“Now what?” Ianto asked, knowing that Jack was asking the same thing.

Owen grabbed a piece of paper off his workstation. His movements were quick and jerky. A pile of paperwork floated to the ground. He grabbed a pen and scribbled across the paper.

_Shut up! No one talks. We break up and do what we’re good at. Figure this out!_

Gwen glared. That, she thought, was an order from the third in command. She wasn’t taking orders from the third in command. She grabbed a pen off of Tosh’s desk and wrote below Owen’s doctor scribble.

_I.J. go to the arc. and find like cases; TS check the net and mf for like cases; OH go deal w/ JH’s blood. NOW._

Owen straightened and glared.

Gwen jutted out a hip and braced her hand on it. She also glared. Ianto slunk away and headed for the Archives. Tosh collected her laptop and returned to the conference room.

Above them the Myfanwy screeched and flapped in a lazy circle around the ceiling. Water bubbled and trickled down the sculpture. Owen glared, shook his head, and then returned to Autopsy to microscope some blood. Gwen sighed. She’d won this round; Owen had backed down.

Lazily, she turned to the stack of files that Ianto left. She flipped through them, skimming the information, but not learning anything new. Time past. It was strange, this silence, she noted. She lifted her head and looked around. Owen was not making noise in the tiled Autopsy. Tosh had left the main area—there was no typing. Ianto was not making coffee or sweeping. Jack wasn’t playing music or talking. It was eerie.

Gwen shivered. This must be what it’s like to be at the end of the world. Suddenly, she wanted to talk to Rhys. She reached into the pocket of her trousers and pulled out her mobile.

Only, if she did that, then Jack—no, that creature—would echo Rhys. What if that thing did to Rhys what the 1971 creature did to Agent Green? Would she have to give the order to shoot her own fiancé? She quickly turned off her phone. No use being careless, after all.

Her eyes skimmed across the Hub to Ianto’s workstation. There was an outside line there. Without thinking about it, she jumped to her feet and hurried over. She dropped to the floor and scrambled under the desk, her fingers seeking for the cord. She found where it met the wall and she tugged. It came free. There. Isn’t that better?

Only, there was a landline in Jack’s office. She ran up the steps. She grabbed the telephone, cradle and all, and yanked it. The cord went taunt and toppled things on Jack’s desk. Papers, pens, a pair of 3-D glasses, and Jack’s corral tumbled onto his blotter. The cord ripped from the wall.

Gwen let out a shaky breath. She had to protect Rhys.

But the other’s still had their mobiles and they might call someone. And what if this alien threat multiplied by the number of people that became echoed? Gwen’s breathing sped up. She had to stop that from happening.

Gwen knew from past lockdowns that it was nearly impossible to get mobile service. No one could call in or out of the Hub. She rounded Jack’s desk and faced his computer. She hit the mouse. The screen sprang to life. She input her ID and password, and then she selected the special menu that controlled the interworkings of the Hub. It took her codes and the selection of “Lockdown—Code 6” (an agent was “In Danger” and a lockdown would protect that agent—well, Rhys wasn’t an agent, but it was close enough). The computer prompted her code again.

The lights went out. Owen yelled. A few seconds later, the emergency generator kicked on. They were safe. Gwen sank down to the floor and crawled under Jack’s desk. No more mobiles. Rhys was safe. Lockdown had made him safe. Suddenly, Gwen’s head and eyelids felt heavy. She curled in a ball and laid her head on her arm. She went to sleep.

As soon as the Lockdown engaged, Owen lost power. His microscope, centrifugation machine, and even his alien information collection tablet (he needed a better name for it, but he refused to ask Ianto for help) ceased to function.

“Shit!” he snarled, forgetting about Jack-turned-myna-bird in the basement cell. The emergency lights kicked on as he searched for his gun. It was gone. No, that didn’t make any sense. He had it when they went out. He put it in his desk—per regulations. He pulled out the desk drawer and hunted, nearly panicking. It was gone. Holy hell, his gun was gone!

Unarmed, he jumped to his feet and hurried out of the Autopsy. He paused at the top of the stairs and glanced out into the Hub. No one was visible. Tosh and Ianto had gone down (at least) one level. He hoped they were together—especially since he was sure that Ianto was now locked in the Archives. Gwen, however, was nowhere to be seen. He crouched low. Nothing. No movement, no noise. He slunk toward the armory.

He needed a weapon.

He risked a glance into the Hub at large before rising up to the keypad. He hurriedly punched in his code—he wanted a big gun with lots of firepower, just in case. His pass code was denied. Again and again, it was denied. In frustration, Owen kicked the glass door. Sure, he knew it wouldn’t open, but so what. He pounded his fists on the glass and hissed in frustration. Some part of his brain reminded him not to talk, but beyond that, all bets were off. He was livid.

He kicked over his desk chair and threw heaping handfuls of paper off his desk. Files slid across the concrete floor. Then below him, something howled. He sunk low, and crawled across the floor, peeking down into the lower level, around the Rift manipulator. Goddamn it! He couldn’t see anything! Fucking lockdown! He crawled, military style, across the ground, past the couch, down the stairs, toward that noise—that horrible, pained noise.

In the conference room, Tosh was having a flashback. When lockdown initiated, it was like the walls began to slide closer. Her UNIT cell had been five strides wide, by six strides long. She could jump and touch more than half the way to the ceiling. She knew every inch of that cell.

Torchwood was huge. It was rooms and hallways and shooting ranges and Weevil cells and Archives and tunnels and emergency bomb shelters and alien fish tanks. She could explore the miles of lower tunnels and, with high enough clearance, walk all the way to London. Even knowing all of that, sometimes, she had to run for the lift and go topside. When she was first hired, Suzie would find her nearly hyperventilating on a bench outside the Tourist Office. It only happened a few times, and Suzie was quite nice about it.

The conference room, however, had no windows. Sure, the old one did, but that was before they opened the Rift and let out some sort of demon. Now, there was lovely wood paneling and a high-tech (very sci-fi) door, but Tosh wasn’t sure there was an emergency exit.

Did she program that door to open in an event of a power loss? She abandoned her laptop and ran for the door. The walls were closing in. She beat her fists on the door, screaming and crying, demanding in every language that she knew that the door open now. Jack saved her from her last cell. Where was Jack?

Then outside the door someone kicked.

“Get me out! Get me out! I can’t breathe! Get me out!” Tosh screamed, her fingernails digging into the paneling.

Someone kicked the door again. In her peripheral vision, something glowed blue and then the door slid away. Tosh gasped and threw herself out the door into Owen’s arms. Owen looked furious. He hugged her to him and then whispered in her ear.

“My codes—my fucking codes!—won’t let me in the armory and yours lock you in! I hate this fucking lockdown!”

Tosh did not understand him, but she clung to him and sobbed into his shirt.

In the Archives, Ianto sat with his head in his hands laughing uncontrollably. Of all the times to get locked into the Archives. He itched to walk, his muscles screamed to move. Mentally, he checked himself. He’d read the 1971 case. He’d panicked over the 1971 case. Extreme paranoia, cabin fever-like behaviors. That certainly explained the restlessness and uncontrollable laughter. Above him the rest of his team was going through any number of behaviors—behaviors that, Ianto theorized, would only grow the longer they were exposed to the alien being using Jack as a host.

Oh God. Jack had something in his head.

Ianto leapt up and paced back and forth. He had about ten feet to pace without walking into a shelf—not a bad pacing space, really. He giggled. The only concession was that the Archives, when in lockdown, were damn dark. Of course, Jack was in the dark too, right now, or bathed in that garish red light. He wondered if Jack was aware of himself. He must be freaking out, Ianto noted. Not in any control of himself—locked in a cell. Locked in his mind!

His pace sped up. His laughter reigned into a nervous hiccup.

This was cabin fever, he noted. Restlessness was one of the more common reactions. Laughter, less so, but he had a hysterical laughing melt down after Canary Wharf, so whatever.

Cabin fever always reminded him of that Stephen King book with the crazy “all work and no play” hotel guy and his “redrum” kid. Ianto rubbed at his neck. Apparently he was also unable to keep a line of thought in his head. At least he was still sarcastic, that had to be a positive sign.

He needed light. Wasn’t there a torch down here somewhere? He headed toward the beginning of the alphabet shelves and hoped that “Li-Ll” would house a “light.”

Owen dragged a sobbing Toshiko up into the main Hub. Some part of him wanted to turn on the CCTV feed and see if Jack was hyperventilating with Tosh. He needed to get her calmed down. He might have to sedate her. He pulled her toward Autopsy, only to have her thrash and cry out.

Apparently, Tosh was not going into smaller places. Owen nodded and forced her to let go of his shirt. Yeah, she needed sedated. He stumbled down the stairs and fumbled around for his penlight. The emergency lights were great, but they weren’t bright enough for this particular space. He’d never understand it, goddamn outside-the-government-paid-for-by-the-crown organization, but they couldn’t get him reasonable wattage for his medical area. What if he needed to operate? He grabbed his penlight and growled at the pitiful lights.

In Jack’s office, Gwen sat up sleepily. Someone was crying. She crept around the rounded edge of Jack’s desk and quietly slipped out of the office. Tosh was curled in a ball on the floor sobbing. The emergency lights were almost a gray color, Gwen noted. It was better than the “Oh Shit Emergency Lights” which were red. It made everything look like it was bathed in blood.

Owen came out of his medical area and Gwen dropped to the floor to go unnoticed. He was carrying a syringe in his hand. He was headed for Tosh. Gwen knew that she hadn’t given the order to give Tosh anything from a needle. That meant that he was doing something without her permission. That also meant that anything could happen—what if, somewhere in some Torchwood record, there was a rule that said that the team could mutiny and reinstate a leader.

If Owen gave Tosh some chemical, she would vote for Owen. Owen was staging a coup!

No one was going to usurp her power. As Owen neared, Gwen ran down the steps and leapt over the banister. She landed heavily on Owen and rolled of him. Owen fell with an “oof!” and the syringe rolled away from him. Gwen jumped up and hit Owen over the head with the first thing she could grab: a binder from his desk. Owen yelled and fell again. Gwen charged for the syringe and snatched it off the floor. As she straightened up, Owen grabbed her from behind, his arms locking over her own.

“Calm down!” he commanded, gruffly.

“I’m in charge!” Gwen screamed, and plunged the needle behind her, directly into Owen’s thigh. He roared as she depressed the plunger and emptied the liquid into him.

“What have you done?” he cried, and fell back. “It was for Tosh!”

Owen stumbled, trying to make his way back to Toshiko. He was keeping an impressive string of curses go about improper lighting, malfunctioning codes, and psychotic colleagues.

“I’m in charge,” Gwen repeated, pouting.

“Owen?” Tosh cried, uncurling to see Owen fall to his knees and sink drunkenly onto the floor. She pulled toward him, and wrapped over him protectively. “We need to get out. We have to get out. I need out. I need out. I need out.” Tosh cried.

Owen tried to grab her wrist, but the drug overcame him and he slept.

Gwen dropped the empty syringe on the floor and lay down. She watched Tosh rock Owen and cry. Eventually, Gwen decided to sleep.

Below them, Ianto was laughing. He bounced his leg as he rifled through another filing cabinet. Someone in the 1890’s had thoughtfully filed a headlamp circa 2003 after it fell through the Rift and Ianto was grateful to be able to use it. The batteries even worked, Ianto was pleased to note. He laughed because it was neon pink. Well, beggars, choosers, whatever. Now, he needed to get to Jack. Only, to do that, he had to get out of the Archives.

There had been no alien lock pick (or an Earth lock pick kit, for that matter) in the Archive, nor a battering ram, nor explosives. Ianto was mildly disappointed. He did, however, have inkling that months ago, Jack had left the Universal handcuff key down in the “sex aids” section. Ianto wasn’t sure that it would work, but it was worth a try. Jack claimed that it was a Universe-accepted key and that multiple devices would open with it. Maybe a little old Earth door lock would be so lucky. Ianto doubled over with giggles—a lucky door with a toy from the sex aids drawer. God, he loved this job.

As he rooted through the filing drawer, he thought about his plan. Obviously, the others would not be able to access the lower floors—well, unless they broke into Jack’s vault and got out that alien lock pick (which Ianto could so use right now), but they didn’t know the code to the vault. Of course, he thought helpfully, the person who engaged the lockdown could always reverse it. Ianto rolled his eyes. God knew why they’d done it in the first place.

Either way, it didn’t seem realistic to expect anyone else to save them. Therefore, Ianto was going to have to go to Jack and… well... fix this. The hysterical laughter stopped abruptly and was replaced with a strange fluttering in his stomach. He’d had a similar feeling in his gut when he was ordered to execute Lisa. Well that line of thinking would get him nowhere. He shoved aside something that felt suspiciously like a breast and his fingers brushed a small piece of cool metal. 

“Aha!” he held the key over his head in triumph.

The key could save the day. He sat on the floor at the door and aimed the light at the keyhole. Keeping the light steady while he worked was difficult. The key slid in the hole and turned.

It clicked—and then broke off in the lock. Ianto let his head drop heavily against the door and he resumed laughing. The headlamp pressed into his forehead painfully. Ianto’s hand, resting on the doorknob, slid down into his lap. As it did so, he accidentally turned the knob. In combination with his weight, and some sort of universal luck, the door opened. Ianto crowed with success.

He jumped up, his legs tingling with pins and needles, and ran down the hall. The torchlight from his headlamp bounced in front of him. He descended stairs and then tried his code into the door into the cells.

“Must be a lower number lockdown,” he mused with a snicker as he opened the door.

In the cell, Jack was watching him. Red light made him look sickly and evil, but Ianto didn’t care. He walked to the keypad at Jack’s cell door and let himself in. Jack said nothing, but watched him keenly. Ianto closed the cell door behind him, just in case.

He moved across the cell and kneeled next to Jack. Jack tracked his movements. Ianto’s irrepressible laughter renewed, and with a sickeningly perfect mimic, so did Jack. It was so startling that Ianto stopped laughing. Instead, he reached into his suit coat and removed a small vial—another something he’d located in the Archives. He uncorked it and reached for Jack.

“Open your mouth,” he commanded, and Jack echoed him—or was it really echoing if Jack was saying it about a millisecond before Ianto?

Either way, Ianto took the opportunity that was presented to tip the vial into Jack’s open mouth. Jack looked surprised, but the poison was already on his tongue.

A year or so before, Jack had insisted that he archive it himself. He claimed it was too dangerous to leave anywhere else. Just a drop on the tongue was instant death. Ianto had used far more than a drop. Already, Ianto could see Jack’s system shutting down. Ianto pulled Jack into his lap and held him against his chest as Jack’s muscles began to spasm.

“I’ve got you, Jack,” Ianto soothed, and Jack didn’t repeat. “I’ve got you, my love.”

Jack died quickly.

\---

Jack and Ianto ascended from the lower floors together. At the first workstation he came to, Ianto began typing in the proper codes to release them from lockdown. Jack moved to Tosh, who was huddled over Owen. She was crying.

“Toshiko?” Jack soothed, brushing her hair from her face. “Are you alright, sweetie?”

“I’ve got to get out,” she whispered hoarsely. She sounded as if she’d been screaming. Her fingernails were ripped off, he noted, and her fingertips bloody.

Safely under her, Owen was snoring the sleep of the drunken or drugged. Jack noted the syringe on the floor and came to a conclusion. “Rough night, I take it?”

Beside them, Gwen stirred and sat up. She stretched and yawned. “I’m in charge,” she whispered like a bossy child.

The Hub powered up. The regular strength lights resumed, the cog door beeped and self-assessed its alignment, and Ianto was prompted to override the Archive lock with his pass code. Jack picked Tosh up. She cried out and tried to cling to Owen’s shirt. Ianto hurried to help. He pulled the medic over onto the couch and swung his deadweight next to Tosh. Immediately, Toshiko curled into Owen’s side.

“I’m in charge,” Gwen growled. She stood and moved to the computer to reset the lockdown. “I need to keep him safe from you.”

Jostled awake, Owen blinked owlishly and then grabbed Ianto’s arm. “Sedate them both.” He left no argument. Ianto looked at Owen with alarm. “Tosh is panicking and Gwen is out of her mind—“ he paused to blink again. His speech patterns matched those of someone worked from a deep sleep. “Use the one in the third drawer.”

Ianto glanced at Jack for confirmation, but Jack was between Gwen and the workstations, his hands up in front of him to pacify her.

“It’s alright, Gwen, the alien is gone. Ianto fixed me,” he assured her gently.

“Lies. He wants Owen in charge. No! He wants you in charge! You can’t have them again! This is my team!” she shouted, irrationally. She grabbed at Jack, as if she couldn’t decide to pull or push him. Jack tried to grab her arms, but she gave out an inhuman scream and kneed him in the groin. Jack groaned and went down.

From the couch, Tosh cried in fear and tried to hide between Owen and the back of the sofa. Owen, his muscles moving sluggishly, braced on the arm of the couch and attempted to stand.

“Jones! Hurry!” he called.

Ianto exited Autopsy at a run and slowed only to assess the situation. He tossed a syringe to Owen, who, due to drug-slowed reflexes, watched it fall in front of him. Gwen was leaned over Tosh’s workstation, entering her pass code. Ianto stepped behind her and jabbed her in the arm. She shrieked. Seconds later, her knees bent and she collapsed into Ianto’s arms. He eased her into a chair.

Jack moaned from the floor and stood with a grimace. “She has bony knees,” he grumbled. Ianto watched Owen sedate Tosh before leaning back on the couch himself.

“It is my medical opinion,” he began, blinking heavily, “that we get to clean air.”

Jack, still walking a bit bow-legged, used Tosh’s station to turn on some sort of air filter before lifting Gwen into a fireman’s carry. “Let’s call it a night, then.”

Ianto carried Tosh out to the SUV, before returning to help Owen as well. Once the vehicle was moving with a rhythmic sway, Owen has succumbed to the sedative once more. Ianto and Jack took their three team members home and let them sleep it off on their respective couches.

“Tomorrow is bound to be an interesting day at work,” Ianto commented, with a slightly hysterical giggle.

Jack looked at him with concern. “Do you need a jab too?”

Ianto rubbed at his face with his hands, “Is Retcon an option, instead?”

Jack reached across the console and laid his hand on Ianto’s thigh. “How about I take you home and if you still want that, I’ll offer it tomorrow?” Ianto nodded in agreement.

“Stay tonight?” he asked hesitantly, his face still covered with his hands.

Jack squeezed his thigh, “I can do that.”

\---

Per Ianto’s prediction, the following day’s debriefing meeting was unusual to say the least. Toshiko sat in a chair far away from the others. She tensed any time someone walked behind her. She stayed near an exit at all times. Owen sat as near to her as she would allow, constantly keeping notes on her behavior. This, while necessary as her doctor, only served to make her more nervous.

“I know that the 1971 report talked about cabin fever, but I have to say,” the medic observed, “I had no idea that we would experience pretty much all the symptoms. It’s not plausible.”

Gwen sat directly at Jack’s right hand and constantly moved his notes so that she could read them herself. Jack looked at her with growing annoyance, and pulled his legal pad back before him to continue with his observations. Ianto, wiggled with uncontrollable restlessness, seemed to be trying to compensate by slipping back into his butler persona. He was taking minutes from the meeting, but remaining invisible as best he could.

“I had no symptoms,” Gwen announced, and marked through a note about herself on Jack’s legal pad. “I was in control of the situation.”

Ianto laughed. He clasped his hand over his mouth and looked genuinely surprised at his outburst. Owen smirked.

“Sure, love. I’m sure you were. I, however, was irritable—“

“What’s new?” Ianto asked under his breath. Owen glared.

“—and irrationally angry about very strange things. However, I seemed to keep a clear head. I watched the CCTV of my actions in Autopsy and I prepared a sedation syringe with proper calculations for Tosh’s body size and symptoms. Also, I noted the lockdown and assessed that I needed a weapon—I got a bit,” he paused and looked at the ceiling, “off then.”

Jack nodded and, after pulling his note pad before him again, made a note about Owen’s understanding of situation in the margin.

“The 1971 case reports that the symptoms continued for about five days,” Ianto added. His knee bounced so fast that the conference table wiggled.

“I remember the clean up after Gill and Maggie’s deaths. It was a long week; this will be a long week too. Tosh, any insights?” Jack directed.

Tosh shook her head no. “I know I’m being irrational,” she began, her voice little more than a whisper, “but I’m still having flashbacks to UNIT.”

Gwen’s head whipped up and she gazed at Tosh. “What happened at UNIT?”

“None of your concern,” Jack intercepted, and then directed his next statement at Tosh. “It’s understandable. I want you to take personal time and speak to Owen about meeting with someone to talk, ok?” Tosh nodded.

Gwen stood up with a rush and her chair flew backward into the wall. “What happened at UNIT? This is my concern because this is my team!”

Tosh cringed at Gwen’s tone. Ianto and Owen locked eyes. The medic was already leaning over to retrieve the sedative that he’d brought to the meeting. Jack, however, didn’t seem flustered.

“Actually, as the director of the Torchwood Institute, this is my organization and, for that matter, my team. I have decided that this situation is a personal matter for Tosh and I want you to let it go.”

Gwen’s face reddened. “You’re always like this Jack! You hide behind your secrets. Is anything you tell us true?”

Ianto rose from his chair and, with a nod to Jack, walked around to table to Toshiko. He offered her his arm and, after she hesitantly took it, escorted her from the conference room. The raised voices were just too much for her at the moment. Jack was sure that, after some proper rest, Tosh would be back to her usual self. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Owen prepping a syringe. Some clear fluid beaded on the head of the needle.

Gwen slammed her hands down on the table in front of Jack. “That thing, that thing that got in your head, did it know who you were? Does it know more than I do?”

Jack looked around Gwen’s arm and nodded to Owen. The doctor moved in quickly and sedated Gwen. She yelled in anger, before slipping into a drugged sleep. Owen dropped the syringe and caught her as she slid down. He looked over her shoulder at Jack with an annoyed smirk.

“Hell of an alien, wouldn’t you say?”

Jack leaned back in his chair as Owen heaved Gwen over his shoulder. He’d known that the team was coming to some sort of ignition point, but this was not quite the fire he was expecting. He glanced down at his diary and noted that next week they were set to thaw out Tommy Brockless. Well, that would serve as a nice team bonding opportunity. They would thaw the World War I solider, eat too much food, and everyone would be happy again by the time the kid went back into the freezer. Yeah, he thought, that was a good plan. The team would be back to normal in no time; nothing could go wrong with an annual cyro thawing.


End file.
